About This Performance

Ottorino Respighi had a peripatetic, jack-of-all-musical-trades career before he moved to Rome in 1913 to teach composition. Rome was then the center of orchestral life – traditionally secondary to opera – in Italy, and in 1916 Respighi completed Fountains of Rome, a colorful four-part symphonic tone poem that made him famous and wealthy. Even more successful was its 1924 sequel, Pines of Rome; Respighi named the villa he bought with its proceeds “The Pines.”

Come for:

Epic sonic thrills.

And more:

The incomparable Thibaudet returns to the Bowl with Liszt’s devilish “Dance of Death.”